Christians and Demons

I have part 2 of the Job series in my drafts currently but I wanted to make a quick post about something I’ve been reading and studying about a lot recently as well as encountering myself. And that is the realm of the demonic and how it affects us as Christians, particularly when it comes to deliverance ministry. Can Christians need deliverance? The answer I have come to is yes, Christians can in fact be demonized and I will do my best to defend that conclusion.

First I want to explain my terminology. I use the term “demonized” rather than “possessed” or “oppressed” because I think that the term possessed has a lot of cultural connotations that are often less than helpful when it comes to working in deliverance ministry and because I think demonized is more accurate of a term. The word our bibles render as “demon-possessed” is the verb form of the word for demon (daimonizomai, Strong’s Greek 1139) and so I use it in lieu of saying demon possessed. It also makes it easier to imagine demonization as a spectrum of severity and the many ways that it presents in different people. Think of it as a sliding scale from 0 to 10, Jesus being a 0 and the Gadarene demoniac being a 9 or 10. There are different levels of demonization and that makes it a little easier to wrap your head around Christians being able to be demonized.

Second I’ll move to some Scriptural arguments for evil spirits having influence over Christians. If we look at the account of Jesus casting out a demon in Luke 4:33-37 we will notice where this is taking place: the synagogue, a church service essentially. Now of course if you assume that believers can’t have demons you’ll assume that the man wasn’t regenerate, but I don’t think we can assume that from the text itself. But I think a clearer text than that is the healing of the woman who was bent double by a spirit. The account is found in Luke 13:10-17 and after Jesus heals/delivers her the Pharisees are indignant that He healed on the Sabbath and in Jesus’ response He calls the woman a “daughter of Abraham” (verse 16). Now this phrase I think makes it very clear this woman is a believer. Jesus rebukes the Pharisees in John 8 and says that they are not the children of Abraham because they don’t believe in Him! (John 8:39) Paul also says that believers are the children of Abraham (Galatians 3:29). Ephesians 4:26-27 also makes it clear that unresolved anger and unforgiveness gives the devil a foothold and Paul is of course writing to believers! And so I think the burden of proof is on those arguing that Christians cannot be demonized to explain these passages.

Third a lot of Christians historically have believed that Christians could be demonized. The Shepherd of Hermas talked about anger being a spirit that could infest a Christian and drive them into all manner of wickedness. Augustine in City of God records three exorcisms he knew of and at least one, possibly two were of believers, the third one not having enough detail to determine either way. John Chrysostom in his Homily 28 on Romans says that “[demons] in some cases even work with the sober-minded” and in context he is referring to believers. And jumping ahead to the 1800s, Johann Blumhardt recalls a very significant two year long battle with demons infesting a woman named Gottlieben in his town and notably he believed she was a genuine believer prior to everything that happened. Blumhardt’s account can be found in full in the book “Jesus is Victor! Blumhardt’s Battle with the Powers of Darkness” which I recently read and recommend. There were manifestations that occurred in the house that honestly defy any explanation other than evil powers. I know that this is a very small list but I provide these few sources to spur the reader into diving deeper on their own on the subject.

And fourth and lastly I pull on my own experience. I have witnessed and taken part in several deliverance sessions where I have seen demons manifest in several ways (unusual voices, strength, shaking, coughing, and others) and every deliverance session I have been a part of has been on someone who is a believer. I won’t go into too much detail for the sake of the individual’s privacy but I believe the cumulative weight of the above three points is enough to convincingly say that Christians can in fact be demonized. I don’t want to sound alarmist or strike fear into any Christians reading this but I believe this is an important topic and that deliverance needs to again take a larger part of our day to day ministry to those around us. I may intersperse posts on deliverance between my posts on Job.

May the Lord bless you and keep you, and make His face shine on you, and grant you peace!